Factory Workers in Tanzania: The Case of Chinese Enterprises at Mkuranga Industrial Park

Abstract

FDI’s plays are of great significance on economic development on both the host country and place of their origins. Tanzania’s recent move of industrialization witnesses a handsome influx of Chinese foreign direct investments in special economic zone. With the increase of FDIs and industrial parks, cheap migrant labors are of great importance to the development of these factories in industrial zones.There has been speculation on mistreatments and misconduct of factory workers in Chinese enterprises. Western scholarship perceives Chinese presence in Africa as the predatory and Chinese workers are not only racist but belittle Tanzanians. On the other hand, Chinese scholarship sees Chinese investments in Africa as mutual beneficial between the two parties.Spending a year on different Chinese and one local owned company in Tanzania, this study employs a reflective model/grounded theory to study Chinese -Tanzanians work relation in industrial area at Mkuranga industrial park in Tanzania. This study discovered that, there is exploitation of unskilled labor through lower wages, unequal treatment of women in factories, skilled labor and those with basic Chinese language skills are treated differently.The study also discovered that, there is racialization of labor in factories. The kind of racialization exists in this factories is however different from that exists between Indians and Tanzanians. The difference is based on the extent of “oppressiveness” as Chinese seemed to be more considerate to workers than Indians. Keywords: migrant, workers, factory, racialization, Tanzania. DOI: 10.7176/DCS/10-5-04 Publication date: May 31 st 2020